


all of this is loveliness

by KestrelGirl



Series: Eirwen and Lyri [3]
Category: Guild Wars 2 (Video Game)
Genre: (sylvari don't care though), Counted Word Fic, Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Everyone Needs A Hug, F/F, Feels, Fluff, Illustrations, Intimacy, Not Suitable/Safe For Work, Nudity, Pet Names, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Romance, Soulmates, Sylvari (Guild Wars), Touching, aka... nice., the PTSD stuff has to do with canon events and canon-typical violence btw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-09
Updated: 2020-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:01:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23049724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KestrelGirl/pseuds/KestrelGirl
Summary: My body falls off the side of her bedAnd now I know what love feels likeDon't let me turn into painAll of this is loveliness(source: AURORA - Soft Universe)Eirwen and Lyri spend an intimate afternoon together while preparing for their wedding.This is my first foray into writing serious relationship content, which is a pretty big and disorienting step for someone like me with zero relevant experience - but in the words of a certain manic sylvari, hooray for progress! It's not particularly detailed about the naughty parts, so I've gone with a Mature rating. But I still wound up with a *nice* word count on purpose. Teehee.
Relationships: OC X OC
Series: Eirwen and Lyri [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1645507
Kudos: 4





	all of this is loveliness

“Hey! Get back here!”

Lyri chases after me, following the light only she can see like a flitting moth, as we run giddily along the winding paths of the lower Grove. I can only hope that to everyone else around us, we look like an ordinary pair of saplings having fun, naked as the day we stepped out of our pods. I had to let my crystal wings shatter for a while to make the illusion complete… but considering I haven’t been swarmed by adoring fans, maybe that was what I needed.

At last Lyri catches up to me, nearly bowling me over with excitement even though she’s much smaller than me. I let her have what she wants, and fall onto my back as she tackles me and rolls us both over and over. We laugh until we’re out of breath. It’s hard to believe someone loves me this much, for the first time since the Dream… since the moment I thought I’d never see her again. I wish our tumble across the grass could last forever, but alas, we come to a stop. Lyri is on top of me, her arms now wrapped around my neck.

“You wanna go inside?” Lyri’s voice is suddenly quieter. She’s trying to be sultry. It’s adorable.

“Sure.” I respond in a whisper. She giggles as she realizes I’m making fun of her. “Uhh… get on my back!” 

I’m not sure where I got that idea, but I guess I said it anyway. I stand up, and carry her into our cozy neighborhood of Dreamer’s Terrace as she whoops and hollers. “Oh, the pool!” she squeals. “Let’s do a double cannonball!”

There’s a pool of water just outside the spiraling, organic apartment complex we call home. It’s small but deep, and hidden quite well from the city around it. Just have to walk through the mercifully empty atrium, and to the left…

“You’re getting heavy,” I joke. “Careful!”

I let my wings reform over Lyri, for just a split second, and carry us up in the highest leap I can muster. We both scream with delight as we splash down from the height. The noise we’re making must be tremendous. As we swim to the surface, I’m distracted for a bit by the thought that some enterprising gossip might find us here. We can’t attract too much attention… 

“What’s wrong, dearheart?” I don’t know how Lyri senses that I’m distracted. Can she see the distant look in my eyes, or can she just _tell?_

“Nothing. Just… we might need to keep it down while we're here. I’m worried someone might barge in, looking for either of us."

“Then let’s just be quiet, and we'll stay for as long as we want.”

You know how I said I wanted that moment, just minutes ago, where we were rolling on the ground in each other’s arms, to last forever?

Honestly, I’d rather have this. Just the two of us, treading water. No words in the stillness, and no worry in our minds: no Bangar, no Jormag.

It’s cool and humid here, on the shaded lower level of the Grove. There are thick, tangled trees around the pool we’re in, and I can see street lamps poking through the gaps. The pathway leading past us, on the other side of the makeshift wall, is rarely traveled - and if someone were to pass by, now that we’re not making a ruckus, all they’d be able to see would be our heads. There’s a bath house to my right, next to the entrance leading back into the atrium - a good place to wash off the debris of a hard day’s work.

Lyri puts her hand on my neck, slowly guiding it down my back. It’s not often that she can see every detail, so she relies on touch to truly know me. Her hand comes to a sudden halt at the base of my spine, and her mouth makes a surprised little O. There is a sprout there, on both of our growth sockets, ready to burst into branches and petals that will twist around our bodies and become our wedding gowns. And these buds are why we’ve come home, free of the burden of armor, to see each other as we are. For now they itch, the wonderful itch of growth, and of a beautiful thing to come. But in a few weeks, she’ll be as gorgeous as ever, and I’ll just be… me in a dress.

The sites of my old scars are a little rough on Lyri’s fingers, even compared to her woody green bark. In seven years, I’d taken hits from blades, blasts, Brand crystals… the list was endless. I can’t help but think that if I were human, made of fragile flesh rather than sturdy wood, I would be dead many times over. Even if I don’t count the time I actually died. 

_Speaking_ of which, Lyri ducks below the surface and plants a kiss between my breasts, a bit too close to the remnants of Balthazar’s killing blow. I grimace a bit and recoil with a splash, even though the wound is long-healed. “Ow… careful!” The pain is more mental than physical; I’m trying to push back the memories of two and a half years ago. Now is not the time.

As the waters calm, I swim back toward Lyri and press my palm to her stomach, on her own scar, a dimple in the bark. This one is fresh, barely a month old. From the arrow. I feel her breaths get quicker as she gazes at what little she can see of me, like a terrified puppy. She hugs me in a way she hasn’t before, holding on tight, begging for love and protection.

“I didn’t mean… I’m sorry, Lyri. I’m so sorry.” She shouldn’t have had to suffer so much, shouldn’t have nearly died for me a second time. I don’t know how else to help, other than to return her embrace, tickling the buds in the small of her back. She ruffles my leafy hair, and her smile returns, a worried smile.

I stroke Lyri’s arm, and she giggles a little and relaxes again. Her limbs are just the slightest bit thinner than they should be, and she doesn’t have the endurance nor the strength of most sylvari. But there is no point in cursing a long-dead dragon for forcing her into the world early, too early to let her experience it with all five senses. I’d rather say the best words I can. “You’re still perfect, dearheart.”

Lyri lets out a contented sigh. “Eirwen?”

“Yeah?”

“What do humans call their loves?”

“Oh my goodness, you wouldn’t believe the names. “Cutie pie,” “sweetie pie.” Can’t blame them; pie is good. “Baby,” for another one, but what is a baby but a tiny helpless crying human? I heard something about “mommy” and “daddy” once, but that just sounded strange. Oh, and there was “honey.” I liked that one.”

“I like it too. Honey’s sweet. Fits you.”

“That’s funny; I was going to say the same thing about you.”

“Oh, and… what’s that other thing that humans do? The one in be-”

“Lyri!” My laughter is more of a cackle at that one. “I haven’t _seen_ it! Wasp-stings if I know what it’s _like!_ ”

“I’m pretty sure they use something down…” Lyri points between her legs. “…here?”

“Lyri, you’re killing me!” It’s a bit hard, I admit, to double over laughing while in the water.

“You know I ask stupid sapling questions sometimes. Learning more about the world makes me want to try new things, now that I have you.”

“What do you mean, “new things?””

“Maybe just… getting to know each other more, while we have peace and quiet. Would that be okay?”

“I suppose so. Just… don’t hurt us both, promise?”

“I promise.”

And then Lyri pulls me under. 

But rather than take the lead, she lets herself sink into my arms. She caresses me, and I find myself exploring her in ways I couldn’t with my eyes alone, below the leaves that preserve some semblance of modesty to the folk around us. Hidden petals slip slowly through Lyri’s fingers. She offers less for my touch to savor, but there is enough; even nothing would be enough. We revel in each other, and it shows on our faces, in the gasps of pleasure and embarrassed laughs that come out only as bubbles.

Yet something nags at me. It’s not easy for a sylvari to drown. But… I’m thinking about everyone else. This time, I’m taken back to seven years ago, fighting in the foul waters of Orr. So many who shouldn’t have fallen. For a moment, Lyri’s face is the face of the only other woman I dared fall for, dragged into the deep by a Risen fiend -

 _No. Stop that._ I sink to the bottom and open myself to Lyri’s kisses, or whatever she wants to do. But rather than oblige, she stops and leads me to the surface to breathe. She can tell I’m worried again. “Eirwen, what’s wrong?”

“I wish it were nothing. I was just… thinking about Orr. There was someone I… tried to move on with, after I lost you. I had to… leave her behind. But you’re here, so I shouldn’t be thinking about this -”

“You couldn’t save her. I can hear it in your voice. It’s okay, my light,” she tells me. “It took so long to find you but… now I’ll always be here. You’re safe.” I have to repeat those final words to myself before I can believe Lyri’s reassurance. “And I forgive you.”

* * *

The unbridled ecstasy and lingering fear gradually wear off, and I lead Lyri toward the water’s edge and into the bath house. I gently move her arm toward one of the streams tumbling from crevices in the walls, and the water dances over her palm. She jumps back a bit and turns to face me with a smile, before walking toward the waterfall again to rinse the muck out of the vines that adorn her head. I join her, and we frolic for just a bit longer, splashing each other playfully and slinging the silliest of flattery back and forth. 

“Mordremoth must have been terrified of allowing you to see how beautiful you are.”

“Good thing that damned dragon couldn’t handle your biceps!”

At last, Lyri yawns. “I’m tired.” 

“Me too.” For a moment I hear a whisper in the back of my mind: _rest._ No, it’s safe to do that here, so far away from Jormag. “Want to lie down on the shore?”

“With you, yeah.”

I hold Lyri’s hand and guide her over to the pool. It’s dusk now, and her faint golden bioluminescence is beginning to peek through as we watch fireflies dance across the pond. She curls up on the damp, mossy soil, her head on one dainty arm. “Love you, you big glowy thing,” she says sleepily.

“Love you too… honey.”

As she nods off and I lie awake next to her, my bark against hers, I realize that maybe _this_ is the moment that I want to last forever.


End file.
